I cannot release you’.”Īccording to a document prepared by the military command at the prison, Guantánamo continues to be “a key intelligence resource,” and has helped “prevent terrorist attacks and has saved lives.” ‘That’s a decision for the colonels, generals and whoever else. “‘I too would be angry, but I am only a sergeant,’ I tell them. I am here to take care of you and feed you’,” says the sergeant, who says he is unaware of the reasons for each inmate’s detention. “I tell them, ‘I understand your frustrations, I am listening to you, I understand perfectly but I can’t do anything. Of the 122 inmates at Guantánamo, 57 have been authorized to leave for a third country when a foreign government decides to accept them. But really I have to be a professional,” he explains.ĭuring his time as prison guard supervisor, he has had some contact with some of the inmates and says he understands how their anxieties grow as they await release. “It was kind of surreal when I first got here because this is Guantánamo. He arrived at Guantánamo eight months ago and has one month more before his duties at the camp end. He holds a regular job at a hotel.įor security reasons, he declined to give his name for this interview. He is 34 years old and for the past five years has been a reservist with the California National Guard. One of the sergeants at Camp 5 is on his first assignment with the military. Whether or not the temptation of food is a card still being played by interrogators at the jail is a mystery, like so many other things at the naval base in the southeast of Cuba, which was set up in 1903 and is home to around 6,000 people. In 2010 he was transferred to a Canadian prison, where he was held until his release last Thursday thanks to a court order. His interrogators told him to choose between a Subway sandwich or a McDonald’s burger, according to declassified recordings. Omar Khadr, a Canadian citizen, was 16 years old when, in 2003, he was interrogated at Guantánamo. ‘Mmmm, this ham is delicious,’ she would say.”Īt the Guantánamo McDonald’s – which has been open for 35 years, and looks just like any of the chain’s stateside restaurants – the two managers say they have no knowledge about any of the establishment’s food being offered to inmates. “ brought in food from the outside just to frustrate me. “Each time they began to torture me, I refused to drink water or eat,” Slahi wrote in his diary. The entrance to the McDonald's at the Guantánamo naval base in Cuba. Guantánamo interrogators, he wrote, would sometimes eat their meals in front of the prisoners to provoke them. Bush to hold suspected terrorists following the Septemattacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The prison was created by the administration of US President George W. Yet after it was authorized, the book was heavily redacted by US government censors in Washington, with more than 2,500 words of his account removed.īorn in 1970, Slahi wrote about the abuses he suffered, which included sleep deprivation, sexual humiliation and being held in stress positions in freezing-cold cells. Slahi wrote about the abuses he suffered, which included sleep deprivation, sexual humiliation and being held in stress positions
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